1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a print system capable of notifying a user of an ink amount required by a printer to perform print operations.
2. Description of the Related Art
There has been known a conventional print system including an information processing terminal for generating original data, a printer controller for converting the original data into print data, and a printer for executing print operations based on the print data.
Specifically, the information processing terminal generates original data. The original data may be data in a page description language (PDL), such as PostScript, or image data, such as Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) image data, Joint Photographic coding Experts Group (JPEG) image data. Because the original data cannot be processed by the printer, the printer controller, such as a raster image processor (RIP), converts the original data into print data which can be processed by the printer. The print data is then transmitted to the printer, and the printer performs print operations based on the print data for forming images on a recording medium.
In a small print system, the printer controller is provided internally in the information processing terminal. However, in large scale print systems, such as a computer network with a larger printer capable of printing banners several meters long, the printer controller is provided as a separate device from the information processing terminal in order to lighten the processing burden on the information processing terminal. In this case, the printer controller is connected between the information processing terminal and the printer.
However, in the print systems described above, sometimes the printer can run out of ink during the middle of print operations. Some printers continue the print operations even though no ink is left. In this case, the image will have undesirable blank spaces where the ink should have been impinged, so that, the print operations must be started all over again.
There has been known a printer that stops printing when ink has run out, and informs the user of the ink run out. After the user has replenished the ink to the printer, the print operations can be restarted from the position where the print operations were stopped. However, while the printing is temporarily stopped, the recording medium may shift in position. As a result, the image can be blur, and the printed image may have an undesirably noticeable blank boundary before and after where printing was temporarily stopped.
In this case also, printing operations need to be started over again. This can be an expensive problem in terms of recording medium and ink cost, especially when a large image is formed on a large recording medium, such as a A0 sized or larger banner.